Bob Barr

A US congressman; an intelligent Yankee ex-prosecutor - with a moderate-to-liberal past - who represents a hardcore right-wing redneck constituency in a Georgia district. To win their hearts and minds, he must pretend to be the bible-thumping-est, gun-toting-est Real Man in all of Georgia; he is, in fact, five foot one and a wuss. He became King of the Hypocrites with his pro-impeachment grandstanding - some of the dirt on his own marriages and mistresses and lies came out.

In other areas, Barr had always supported the Libertarian position, such as supporting strong Second Amendment rights, opposing high taxes, high government spending, and bureaucratic regulation. Barr remained somewhat at odds with Libertarians on the issue of abortion, which Barr still strongly opposes, although he would leave it entirely to the states to determine whether they would permit or prohibit the practice. The Libertarian platform has long advocated an absence of regulation of the practice, even at the state level.

As of August 2008, Barr was polling as much as 10% in certain states such as New Hampshire, Oklahoma, and Nevada, and has been deemed by some as a potential spoiler who could cost John McCain the election. Barr's campaign manager, Russ Verney, chalked "spoiler" talk up to the McCain campaign wanting to have a ready excuse for losing. Barr followed a strategy that would not require him to win outright in the Electoral College. He relied instead on McCain and Barack Obama to run a fairly even race, giving Barr a possibility of hanging the Electoral College by winning just a handful of Libertarian-leaning states such as New Hampshire, Wyoming, Montana, and Alaska, possibly along with Barr's current home state of Georgia, and his birth state of Iowa.

Barr did not win any states, getting about a half-million votes as Barack Obama won the election in a landslide, registering the biggest victory by a Democrat in over forty years. But in two states, North Carolina and Indiana, the vote for Barr was greater than the difference between Obama and McCain, meaning that if Barr voters had instead gone with McCain, those states would have been won by McCain.